My birthday is my new year. This is when I set my goals, and decide what kind year I want to have going forward. Generally I create a theme based upon what I want, more specifically how I want to feel.

This year, I want to explode! Specifically, I want more pleasure, passion, and power. Not power as in “world domination.” Power as in the ability to see it, believe it, and achieve it within one year, no excuses or exceptions!

As I woman I know I am most open, most receptive in life when we are in the thoroughs of pleasure and passion. When I am giving someone, or some-thing, my all. When I am simply a wide open channel, totally surrendering to the moment. That happens when we are 100% confident in ourselves – not just our skills and ability, but our look, our walk, our talk, our femininity, our ability to deliver. If you feel confident about yours skills, but not your shoes, you do not deliver with as much power or passion at the podium, so to speak — too busy making sure the your shoes are hidden. That’s not to say you don’t do well. But regardless of the results when we don’t feel good, feel confident, the results ultimately don’t matter.

How many women (and men) got it going on and no matter how much you say it, they do not feel it, believe it, live it. Low self-esteem and a lack of confidence are the building blocks of poor relationships and abuse, both giving and receiving, to self and others.

Think about a time when you felt the most free, not worried about anything. It was likely at some point when you were having a good time. When your face was turned to the sun, you were laughing, dancing, playing, giggling, perhaps even climaxing (had to throw that in there it counts!). No one is thinking about their “shoes,” i.e. their education, career path, weight, or makeup, in the midst of unbridled joy, ecstasy, or pleasure. You are open, receptive, all in for all the moment has to offer.

If you think about it, our biology functions the same way. We are most open, most fertile when we are being pleasured writhing in ecstasy, passionately embracing both the giving and the receiving of pure pleasure. It is during these moments seeds are planted (sometimes literally – yes, I’m back to the climax).

Pleasure is the pathway to making yourself a fertile landscape. If you aren’t having fun, how can you be open to the possibilities of life. Negativity creates stagnation and constricts. It constrict thoughts, which constricts action. Pleasure, opens. It opens thought, action. You are more willing to take risks, and the failures are just good times on the way to success.

Nothing empowers a woman (men too) than joy. That the love and zest for living for life. When can’t wait for the next day to throw off the covers and get to ‘it” whatever the ‘it” is, you are living from place of pure pleasure and a passion for life, your life! It is this place that gives you the self-confidence, self-esteem, to take risks (whether or not you have the right shoes) and put yourself out there. Because when it’s a good time, the shoes don’t matter. Either you don’t think about them or you don’t care what others think about them. And, if they hurt your feet, you do your thing barefooted!

That’s the kind of confidence pleasure can bring you. I promise you, the last time you went to see a comedy at a moving theater, you weren’t wondering if anyone knew that your underwear didn’t match in the middle of a belly laugh. Or that you didn’t complete your degree. You laughed. Loudly! Snorting. With popcorn in your teeth, slapping people’s legs, high fiving and making rude or lewd comments the whole show! You DGAF (Did not give a F*ck) what anyone thought of you in those moments. Pleasure is joy drunk on passion. Pleasure is Confidence. Pleasure is a one of the purest pathways to self-esteem and personal power.

Want to raise confidence become a personal power passionista! Check out these 5 ways to boost your self-confidence that feel really, really good!

1 – Dump the negative self-talk. Do not allow yourself to say anything that isn’t loving or affirming. I used to feel fat all the time. Then I realized it was because I was constantly telling myself that. If someone else said that to my face, I would “unfriend” them in my life. If someone said that to my child, I would go all “mama-bear” on them. So why would I tolerate that kind of language to myself about myself.

2 – Make the time to be good to yourself. Treat yourself the way you would want others to treat you. One uneventful birthday many years ago I realized I was waiting for people to give me things I didn’t give to myself. First, it’s not their responsibility to give me anything. And second, why wasn’t I giving these things to myself? It was my life. Who better than me, to give me exactly what I want, the way I wanted, when I wanted it. And I had a blast doing it! I’ve had hands down the best birthdays since that realization. Now I am confident my birthday will ALWAYS be exactly what I want.

3 – Do not allow anyone in your life who does not treat you as well you treat yourself (which is why you make sure you have blowing the lid off 1& 2). I expect people to treat me as well as I treat myself, in terms of respect, honesty, and compassion. I don’t speak negatively or engage in self-abuse, I’m certainly not going to let someone else do it.

4 – Say no to the things you don’t want, and say yes to the things you do. It’s your life. Own it. Do the things you love. Stop doing things you don’t love.

5 – Have some effing fun! Make time, create time to have some fun, laugh, play, sing, dance. If you aren’t consciously making an effort to allow yourself the space for fun, the openness pleasure, and to be captivated by passion who will? Pleasure and passion happen when we are open to it. When we actually open our minds, our hearts, and spirits to the unexpected, to joy, to laughter, to spontaneity, to serendipity.

Any one of these five tips not only feel good, but will seriously lighten your load and supercharge your self-confidence. Give yourself permission to open up, be surprised beyond what would normally be expected. Allow space for the good to flourish, the giddy to lighten your heart, for power to give you momentum and explode in your life as you ride the waves of pleasure and passion to become the self-confident woman you know yourself to be.